I’m male and I am aaid that I might be gay

Contents:

• I LIKE GUYS BUT I DON’T WANT TO BE GAY. HOW DO I STOP BEG GAY?
• I’M MALE AND I AM AAID THAT I MIGHT BE GAY
• CAN SOMEONE BE HOMOSEXUAL AND NOT GAY?
• ‘I AM GAY – BUT I WASN’T BORN THIS WAY’
• I DON’T WANT TO BE GAY…
• HOW TO BEHAVE AROUND GAY PEOPLE IF YOU DON'T ACCEPT THEM
• HOW TO ACCEPT THAT YOU ARE GAY
• HOW TO KNOW IF YOU ARE GAY
• HOW ‘WHO R’ HAS BEE WORD ONLE FOR ‘I HATE GAY PEOPLE’

I LIKE GUYS BUT I DON’T WANT TO BE GAY. HOW DO I STOP BEG GAY?

It is very homogeneo/ hetero-normative and beg a tholic stutn is not the easit environment for queer stunts. There are many gay men who say "I'm not part of the scene" -- men who hate gay bars and, prumably, crowds of queer people general.

I’M MALE AND I AM AAID THAT I MIGHT BE GAY

Internalized homophobia -- self-shamg, self-hatred -- leads many gay men, and many queer people general, to recreate their closets long after they're "out" by shunng others, particularly those they nsir "flamboyant. But you mt spend time wh others, whether that means havg a group of gay movie iends or queer gamers or playg on a gay sports team. This parable piece by lbian wrer Sarah Prager go through the lp of great gays who changed the world -- om ventor Alan Turg to Tchaikovsky, the poser, to the Renaissance pater and ventor Leonardo da Vci.

Read the numbers: In four years, more than 5, 596 people the Uned Stat had died of AIDS, many of them gay men and transgenr women.

Fd a gay elr who's been where you are and r for your well-beg, someone who unrstands you and never pass judgment, someone who lets you make the mistak you need to make. Tmp has repeatedly attacked transgenr servicemembers, and gay men are still beg hunted and murred Chechnya. There would be no ternalized self-hatred if no one had ever told you that beg gay is wrong, or that gay sex is disgtg, or that gay men n't feel real love, or that beg transgenr is fake, or that beg nonbary is a mental illns or a ll for attentn.

CAN SOMEONE BE HOMOSEXUAL AND NOT GAY?

If you thk a word like "gay" or "queer" works for you right now (aga, don't have to work for you forever -- labels do not e wh lifetime ntracts) and you're not ready to tell everyone, simply say out loud to yourself. However, at the surface, I fantasise over homosexual sex and many people believe that I am gay, and exprs those opns – and have done for longer than I n remember. People fd me funny and ‘sweet’ and I n’t really thk of anyone who I don’t get on wh, however people still assume I’m gay even though I ask out many women, and show affectn to women.

I don’t want to be gay, as I said, ep down I am ashamed of the way I feel, I still feel as though is not normal, which may have origated om my parents views. I don’t know what to do, I’m ightened that I will be gay, and am tryg to fight off, as though were an chy jacket!

The other thg to remember is that vast numbers of so lled heterosexual men and women have gay fantasi - but they choose never to do anythg about them. And then there are huge numbers of ostensibly heterosexual men this untry who marry happily and have children but who also like to fd exprsn gay love om time to time. So when we therapists are nonted wh male clients, often married on, who e to wh ep nflicts about their sexual attractn to other men, we often fd that they are willg to e the word “homosexual, ” but chew the “gay” label.

‘I AM GAY – BUT I WASN’T BORN THIS WAY’

Bee “gay” impli an embracg of the gay liftyle — gay bars, gay pri paras, perhaps multiple sex partners, or even anonymo sex. Unfortunately, much of our natn’s polics have long exacerbated the problem as well, shamg and vilifyg homosexualy, leadg legns of men stgglg wh sexual inty to ternalize their homophobia.

I DON’T WANT TO BE GAY…

I warned them of the pfalls of keepg their sexual orientatn secret: a life of creased prsn, pursug a secret life the gay unrground wh the danger of beg ught, how attemptg to supprs urg n often e them to bee even more obssed wh them. I have treated many men who are of Mormon, Orthodox Jewish, Catholic, and other religns who thk of homosexualy as a pathology.

HOW TO BEHAVE AROUND GAY PEOPLE IF YOU DON'T ACCEPT THEM

Their pa is excciatg, but I honor their bravery riskg losg everythg to ensure they have a qualy life as a gay man. They may need, om time to time, to seek further therapy, but wh the right therapist, one who has thoroughly unrstood the dangers of such practic of “reparative therapy” which the therapist seeks to change the client’s sexual inty om gay to straight.

Bee the labels “homosexual” or “gay” rry such a stigma, some of the men seek help for their “sex addictn” and see their homosexualy as an actg out of same-sex urg. Really, if you read the stori of olr bisexuals and homosexuals who tried to live their whole liv the closet, they'll break your heart seven ways to Sunday. Unrstand that you're hardly alone the feelgs: there are a pretty rare few of who are gay, lbian, bisexual, queer, etc who haven't strongly wished we weren't at one pot or another, mostly -- and often ONLY -- jt bee the world we live n still be so discrimatory and uniendly towards , and beg anythg but heterosexual -- a siar way to beg anythg but whe -- n sometim be somethg that mak our liv more difficult than might be otherwise.

HOW TO ACCEPT THAT YOU ARE GAY

Md, more people are bisexual -- whether they choose to partner wh someone of the same genr or not -- than those who are heterosexual and homosexual, even though more people intify as heterosexual and choose to live their liv only datg oppose-sex.

In other words, your fay havg any level of homophobia isn't about you -- save that theirs likely bbed off on you, too -- 's about them. However, 90% of the time people fd out that I am gay, I’m treated different than what a normal person would be.

HOW TO KNOW IF YOU ARE GAY

I’ve been lled “urageo” and “amazg” for beg openly gay while at the same place my straight peers are actively beg discrimated agast due to them beg normal the ey of society. You so obvly nnot be gay, was her implitn, bee this is good was 2006, a full five years before Lady Gaga would set the Born This Way argument atop s unassailable cultural perch, but even then the popular unrstandg of orientatn was that was somethg you were born wh, somethg you uldn’t change.

I me out at a nservative Christian llege the US and was a gay relatnship for around two years wh a basketball player who end up marryg a woman.

Well, you mt have been gay the whole time, some might thk, and bee of some relig shame, you cid to lie to yourself and experiment wh a girl. But what feels most accurate to say is that I’m gay – but I wasn’t born this people may fd their sir changg directn - and n't jt be explaed as experimentatn (Cred: Ignac Lehmann)In 1977, jt over 10% of Amerins thought gayns was somethg you were born wh, acrdg to Gallup. Throughout the same perd, the number of Amerins who believe homosexualy is “due to someone’s upbrgg/environment” fell om jt unr 60% to ias reached cril mass pop culture, first wh Lady Gaga’s 2011 Born This Way and one year later wh Macklemore’s Same Love, the chos of which has a gay person sgg “I n’t change even if I tried, even if I wanted to.

HOW ‘WHO R’ HAS BEE WORD ONLE FOR ‘I HATE GAY PEOPLE’

” Vios started circulatg on the ter featurg gay people askg straight people “when they chose to be straight. ” Around the same time, the Human Rights Campaign clared unequivolly that “Beg gay is not a choice, ” and to claim that is “giv unwarranted crence to roundly disproven practic such as nversn or reparative therapy. ”People who challenge the Born This Way narrative are often st as homophobic, and their thkg is nsired backwardAs Jane Ward not Not Gay: Sex Between Straight Whe Men, what’s tertg about many of the claims is how transparent their speakers are wh their polil motivatns.

“Such statements, ” she wr, “fe blogil acunts wh an obligatory and nearly ercive force, suggtg that anyone who scrib homosexual sire as a choice or social nstctn is playg to the hands of the enemy. ” People who challenge the Born This Way narrative are often st as homophobic, and their thkg is nsired backward – even if they are themselv, for example, Cynthia Nixon of Sex and The Cy fame. Callg me “idtic” and “patently absurd”, Aravosis wrote, “The gay haters at the relig right uldn’t have wrten any better.

”Gay rights do not have to hge on a geic explanatn for sexualy (Cred: Ignac Lehmann)For Aravosis, and many gay activists like him, the public will only accept and affirm gay people if they thk they were born gay. Patrick Grzanka, Assistant Profsor of Psychology at Universy of Tennsee, for stance, has shown that some people who believe that homosexualy is nate still hold negative views of gays.